This study uses intraindividual variability and change methods to test theoretical accounts of self-concept and its change across time and context and to test the developmental implications of this variability. The 5-year longitudinal study of 541 youths in a rural Pennsylvania community from 3rd through 7th grade included twice-yearly assessments…

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death in many Western countries. An exploration of factors associated with suicidality may help to understand the mechanisms that lead to suicide. Two samples in Germany (n = 500 and n = 477) were examined via Internet regarding suicidality, depression, alcohol abuse, adverse childhood experiences, and…

Case analysis is often used in early childhood teacher education as a constructivist method for developing students' professional skills and knowledge. Although case-based instruction is popular, the professional literature contains little empirical evidence that it effectively helps students develop professional knowledge. Indeed, some empirical…

Sand play commonly occupies children at preschools, child-development centers, and school and park playgrounds. The authors review the research on sand play and present a small study on outdoor sand play conducted at a university-based, child-development center using a method they call "facilitated-action research." This study had four…

Rough-and-tumble play, or play fighting, is common in the young of many mammals. Research on play fighting among rats shows that there are many levels of neural control over this behavior: subcortical mechanisms mediate the motivation and behavior of such play, and the cortex provides mechanisms by which the play changes with age and context. The…

Jaak Panksepp, known best for his work on animal emotions and coining the term "affective neuroscience," investigates the primary processes of brain and mind that enable and drive emotion. As an undergraduate, he briefly considered a career in electrical engineering but turned instead to psychology, which led to a 1969 University of…

This study examines elementary science content standards curriculum coherence between the People's Republic of China and the United States of America. Three aspects of curriculum coherence are examined in this study: topic inclusion, topic duration, and curriculum structure. Specifically this study centers on the following research questions: (1)…

This report presents findings from the two-year Minnesota Family Literacy and School Readiness study. It provides information on the impacts of participating Family Literacy programs and on the first and second cohorts of children (and their families) enrolled in these programs. The Minnesota Early Learning Foundation provided the Amherst H.…

Background: Sensory integration theory proposes that because there is plasticity within the central nervous system (the brain is moldable) and because the brain consists of systems that are hierarchically organised, it is possible to stimulate and improve neuro-physiological processing and integration and thereby increase learning capacity.…

This is the third edition of the ECERS-E, formerly called "Assessing Quality in the Early Years: Early Childhood Environment Rating Scale (ECERS-E)." The ECERS-E is an instrument for measuring quality in literacy, numeracy, science and diversity as observable in pre-school in relation to child cognitive and social/behavioural…

From 2006 to 2010, Sierra Health Foundation's REACH program committed $8 million to support the healthy development of youth in the Greater Sacramento, California, region. As a centerpiece of the larger grantmaking strategy, seven grantees in the region were selected to create community coalitions that involved both youth and adults in their…

This study was conducted with White American kindergarten teachers from a southeast region of the United States to examine their beliefs about culture and social competence. Overall, from a sociocultural perspective, these teachers had limited understanding of young children's social competence and showed varying degrees of cultural knowledge for…

Objective: Adolescence is a developmental period that entails substantial changes in risk-taking behavior and experimentation with alcohol and drugs. Understanding how the brain is changing during this period relative to childhood and adulthood and how these changes vary across individuals are key in predicting risk for later substance abuse and…

Through play, children develop cognitively, socially, emotionally and physically. Preschoolers go on a journey of self-discovery during play activities, learning self-regulation and how to accurately represent themselves in the environment. This study explored the play behaviours of eight different children in two different schools. Four children…

The goal of this longitudinal study is to examine the relationships between early child factors (i.e., age at identification, enrollment in early intervention, oral language skills) and school readiness skills (i.e., conceptual knowledge) in a group of young children with hearing loss (HL). Standardized language, cognition, and conceptual…